I agreed with much of what Jorge Silvetti wrote in “The Muses Are Not Amused.” Metaphors enrich a description by fabricating an image for it; they are tools utilized to humanize and articulate a ‘phantom’ for a project, but the final result must perform for its inhabitants and not just appear to act out the author’s intent in building form.

The whole paragraph about Baroque architecture made me think of a Venetian baroque architect, and an absurdly baroque church façade in Venice, where in stead of the engaged columns, figures of struggling men hold up the story above. The style humanizes the architecture, refers metaphorically to the program relating to the strength of man, and yet is not imposing a story about the internal spatial proportion, especially because the church was constructed before the baroque façade was added. The architect pushed creative liberties and experimented, but evolved from established references. The current forms of buildings that Jorge Silvetti criticized, on the other hand, seem to be the result of insecurity about the articulation of inherent spaces. They don't explore space as a generator, but form, and so work from the outside in. If working boldly spatially from the inside out, form develops naturally, independently of the metaphor. I agree with Jorge Silvetti that a big abstract idea is not necessarily the recipe for success in a project. The constraints guide the evolution and development of a project, and so a grounded, yet rigorous, approach could extract more innovative a proposal than an intangible idea.

Baldassare Longhena's Ospedale degli Incurabili: